by Wendy Fraser

Created on: August 09, 2009

It seems that few have heard the tale of the Packwoman's Grave, yet it's a tale that's been handed down for generations amongst those who live in the Lake District. Like much folklore it gets changed with the telling. Bill Birkett of Little Langdale recalls his grandfather telling him about the Packhorse Woman's Grave.

Alfred Wainwright writes, in 1955, about "the packwoman's grave, neglected and forgotten within very easy reach of the [Rosset] ghyll ... whose mortal remains were found and buried here 170 years ago. A simple cross of stones laid on the ground, pointing southeast indicates the grave, it has suffered little disturbance down the years, but because so many folk nowadays seem unable to leave things alone, its precise location is not divulged here." The source of his information was a Mr. Mounsey of Skelwith.

Legend has it that she perished during a snow storm and her remains were not found and placed in a grave until the snows had melted. Further research into any accounts of weather conditions from those decades might provide a more accurate dating. For instance, in the book Rydal by M L Armitt (1916) we are told that the account book of Rydal Hall records on February 3rd 1757, "we have had a great storm of snow for near a month and excessive frost". If Wainwright's dating is correct, her death would have occurred during the latter half of the 1700s.

The poem (below) by T H Collinson, MA (found in Lakeland Poems and Others published by Charles Thrunam & Sons, 1905), written at least 50 years prior to Wainwright's account, unfolds more details in a vivid and imaginative description of the sad event.

It's a long poem but well worth taking the time to read.

A TALE OF ROSSET GHYLL

by T H Collinson, MA

Introduction

A man of Langdale told me that, when he was a child, he knew a place, near the head of Rosset Ghyll, where tradition said generations before a woman had been buried.

Overtaken by a storm, in crossing over from Wastdale into Langdale, she lost her way, died of exposure, and was buried when and where she was found. Reputed to have been a vendor of small-wares, pins, needles, thimbles, etc. (the reason for the italic word will be seen later), it was believed that the basket, in which she carried about her goods, with all its contents, had been buried with her. He still remembers the believers and the disbelievers in the old tradition discussing its merits, until, to settle the question, some men dug up the soil around the traditional

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